A Pioneer

I don't know what winter does to me. Today was another sombre day at home. Fortunately, I put on a Begum Akhtar CD on the music system and it helped a lot in stabilizing my senses :)

Now, I have earlier remarked that BA, is one from my list of three favorite singers. She had pioneered the "semi-classical-ization" of the ghazals in our country. The album is unique in the sense that every ghazal is preceded by a short dialog by the 'Mallika-e-Ghazal'.

Below is ghazal that was all over me today, and a down-sampled version of the same.

ख़ुदा के वास्ते आ बेरुख़ी से काम न ले,
तड़प के फिर कोई दामन को तेरे थाम न ले|

बस एक सज्दा-ऐ-शुकराना पा-ऐ-नाज़ुक पर,
ये मैकदा है यहाँ पर ख़ुदा का नाम न ले|

ज़माने भर में हैं चर्चे मेरी तबाही के,
मैं डर रहा हूँ कहीं कोई तेरा नाम न ले|

मिटा दो शौक़ से मुझको मगर कहीं तुमसे,
ज़माना मेरी तबाही का इंतकाम न ले|

जिसे तू देख ले इक बार मस्त नज़रों से,
वो उम्र भर कभी हाथों में अपने जाम न ले|

रखूँ उम्मीद-ऐ-करम उससे अब मैं क्या 'साहिर',
की जब नज़र से भी ज़ालिम मेरा सलाम न ले|
-- साहिर भोपाली

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Blame

It is again that time of the year here. Sun disappears from the sky during the days and cold wind blows, pricking every skin. For me it is the time, when I am low-down, most disgusted with my life and my achievements of the year. Somehow I am always able to put the blame on the same thing.

Wonderfully said by 'Mahir Ratlami'

उनके आशिक़ की ज़िंदगी 'माहिर',
कितनी नाकामयाब होती है|

The 'matla' is interesting too....

जो नज़र कामयाब होती है,
आप अपना जवाब होती है|

Subprime Crisis

The US economy is in a bit of a problem. The subprime mortgages issue is now at its peak. I was just reading an article on the internet, which was detailing the efforts of the US State Treasury Department in mitigating the crisis.

We all have a lesson or two to learn from the situation. Do not borrow more than you can repay. And nothing in this world always surges northwards. Yes, not even property prices. Nature and time are powerful factors that can make any speculation or rule go wrong.

The US State Treasury also deserves some praise. It has stepped in and mediated at the right time. The lending firms too realize that it is fruitless to stress on contractual agreements, when their borrowers are in no position to pay the higher interest rates. The significant comment that came from the Senior VP of Mortgage Bankers Association that, "All these people are contractually obligated to pay these loans on the terms they agreed to pay on. We need to focus on people who, without this help, wouldn't be able to stay in their homes".

The last line in the above statement is a perfect balance of business continuity and the human factor of doing business. Can such a thought even occur to entrepreneurs, politicians, trade union leaders and business houses of our country?

Theory and Practical

In every field, be it religion, science, arts, sports, economics and others, there are two different kinds of contributors. One are the researchers who dwell in detail about a single topic and come up with new theories in their respective fields. These theories provide the stepping stones for the other genre, the "implementors" who actually put this theory into practice, by their innovations, experience and talent. Theory which gathers dust in the books is of no value, till implemented for public use. Let us take examples of some "implementors" in this blog.

Religion: Here in the name of texts we have the sacred "Veds" and "Upanishads". These are very difficult to understand as they dwell upon the basic structure of our existence. However, there have been a number of preachers who have brought the core knowledge to the common man in a palatable format. For example, Sankaracharya with his "Advaita Vedant", Swami Dayananda with the establishment of "Arya Samaj" and Swami Vivekananda with his speeches on Hinduism in the U.S. and his complete works, that try to simplify the language of the "Veds".

Science: Offers plenty of examples. Thomas Alva Edision, is one who probably revolutionized the entire concept of using scientific research, for commercial purposes. His entrepreneurship opened the flood gates for inventions of technological devices in the field of science and technology.

Sports: For this I will select a more contemporary and "local" hero, Rahul Dravid! Yes, in case you have watched him bat, he demonstrates that all that is written in the text books on batting in cricket, can actually be applied on the field. What is more important is that he is phenomenally successful, and improvises on all conditions across the entire world where international cricket is played. Though the "best batsman" of our times can go wrong in tough conditions, "The Wall" rarely makes a mistake.

Art(Music): Some may even chuckle after reading the name, Jagjit Singh. But the fact is that he has always tried to package the Hindustani Classical music into a more attractive form for the younger generation which is bombarded by the western music broad casted from the skies above. In return he has always received brickbats and criticism from the "connoisseurs". He has been critised for introducing santoor, guitar and synthesizers in 'ghazals'. Seniors have frowned when he demonstrates his strong knowledge in sound recording and sound engineering. But these masters, forget that the entire non-film commercial music industry was brought in by him in our country of which even the classical music is an integral part now.

To finish off, just a small sample, where the master is trying hard with the sound-engineer, to get the difference between a note to the correct frequency. Isn't it great to see a "semi"-classical singer trying to get the sound effects right, so that it pleases the audience?

This was on 6th of May 2006, before the San-Fransico concert. Along with the usual band of his musicians, it is a pleasure to see Deepak Khazanchi on guitar, albeit a much older look now!

A Nightmare

I always dream of this nightmare. It came yet again yesterday. Our house is somewhat close to the domestic and international airports and the Western Air Command (Around 6 km from the airport). Often the aircrafts fly past our houses at a low altitude, for the final landing.

From time to time I have this dream, that some aircraft has crashed into our colony and everything is burning all around. This basic form is sometimes modified to another form. In that version, I see an air combat in operation and one or two of them get hit and crash land. I literally see the combat in progress!

I have had these sort of dreams many times. It is infrequent though, maybe once in 6-7 months. I don't know what is the physiology behind all this, and neither do I ever want to ponder much about this. Just wish that this never comes true in my life!

Troubled Neighbourhood

Our neighbour is in trouble and it saddens me. I would like to see the happy faces and a peaceful existence for the common man in that country.

The steps taken to contain rising terrorism and military reverses there, are open for debate, and I am least bothered with them. What worries me is the fact that if things go wrong, we could have a situation, where the military revolts, and different factions are formed within the armed forces. When that happens, all hell will break loose. A neighbour who is internally disturbed tries to find quick solutions by diverting attention to external issues, and 'manufacturing' situations in the region. I hope we are prepared and our neighbour is matured enough.

Reminding me of the 'marshal law', I heard very strong comments by Ahmed Faraz, when it was imposed during the younger days of his life. He even cited, the reason for staying out of his mother land painfully, in his ghazal "Qurb-e-jaana na maikhaane ka mausam aaya....".

Staying with Faraz, just remembered a classic rendition by Lata Mangeshkar of his ghazal in 'Sajda':

Aankh se door na ho dil se utar jaayega,
Waqt ka kya hai guzarta hai guzar jaayega.

Tum sar-e-raah-e-wafa dekhte rah jaaoge,
Aur wo baam-e-rafaaqat se utar jaayega.

You can listen to more of this ghazal in Faraz's voice:

Ankh_se_door.mp3

Dil ya Dimaagh

It is different fun altogether, when the entire team goes out for a movie, and that too in office hours! We did exactly that today, during the closing hours of our workday. This luxury was awarded to us, as we yet again received the highest possible customer satisfaction rating from our client.

Now for the movie, "Jab We Met". As confusing is the title, the story and performances are left wanting. The popular "Mauja hi Mauja" song is most misplaced, as it appears at the end of the movie. As is the custom amongst the audience of Delhi-NCR (and may be other cities), they stood up to leave as soon as the credits started rolling on the screen, thus missing half of the song.

At one place though, a very serious question came up in the story. This dame had to take a decision about which guy to chose as her beau. One was a decision based on her wishes of the heart and the other one with her mind and the prevailing situation surrounding her.

This is a question that has bothered me for sometime. Should love be as blind as
बेवफ़ा भी हो सितमगर भी जफ़ा पेशा भी,
हम ख़ुदा तुमको बना लेंगे तुम आओ तो सही| -- मुमताज़ मिर्ज़ा
or should the decision be based on careful thought about the future of the relationship?

WoW VLC!

I remember blogging few months ago, regarding my experience with Vista. The only thing that was now causing trouble, was watching videos/DVDs on it. Vista kept on crashing. Searching the internet I came to know that this problem has a technical term in the industry now; Timeout Detection and Recovery (TDR). This is well documented on the MS website.

Unfortunately, even after updating to the latest drivers from NVidia, the problem remained as it is. Last week, I downloaded the latest version (0.8.6c) of VLC Media Player for Vista and installed it. The same video that kept on crashing in WMP 11 or Real Player, worked perfectly fine on VLC! The DVDs too run absolutely fine now.

I have not been able to identify the exact reason, maybe it is the codec that WMP and other players use or the default codecs configuration in my system. Will do some R&D and post here, if I find the exact reason.

At this moment I am a happy Vista customer!

World Champion

This is not about our cricket team. Notice the singularity in the title. It is about "Vishy" winning the World Chess Championships 2007 in Mexico. This is the second time he wins the championship, the first time being in the year 2000 beating Alexei Shirov 3.5 - 0.5 in Tehran.

I remember way back in 1995, when he played his first championship match against Kasparov. He got visibly nervous, when Kasparov unleashed himself in the 10th game. They were playing the Ruy Lopez (Open Variation) and the game went; 14. Bc2! Qxc3 15. Nb3!! and Anand taking 45 minutes to respond with 15. ... Nxb3. Anand eventually lost the match as Kasparov established his hitherto unknown forte in the Dragon Sicilian defense.

Though I am a patzer, I have a lot of interest in the game. In those days the games got published in the newspapers and I used to cut the clippings and stick them in a notebook. However, due to lack of guidance I could not make much progress into these games. Now I have a powerful processor, all the games in PGN format, the necessary software to analyze the games, but no time to spend for the game! I find it very hard to concentrate on the board, 10 minutes into it.

Hoping that Anand wins a lot more matches, and inspires many more youngsters to take up this game seriously at commercial levels.

Kudos to him and his team again!

Phir Usi Bewafa Pe Marten Hain

The music of JS is like my lost love. How much ever I try to convince my mind, that his compositions these days are very much unlike in quality than the yesteryears, they impose on my mind even stronger, gripping me like a crab.

The latest is from his latest album 'Karuna' (Released by EMI, Marketed by Virgin Records (India) Pvt. Ltd). As I was listening to this album, he switched to a clip, that I used to recite in my childhood. Hearing the master recite this, tripped all my circuit breakers of nostalgia and opened the flood gates of the eyes. He does this so often.

Below is a down sampled version of the clip, hope this will not impinge on the master's copyrights.

Express Cricket

Nowadays this new T20 thing is being injected into our systems. I do not like it at all, as of now. Maybe I will start to, once I have no option left, other than to watch this "further-shortened" version of the game. Further, seeing the less capable teams scoring at an express rate, with no respect for the bowlers, makes me wonder, if anybody in the future would be interested to pursue his career as a bowler in this game. Just watch what Sri Lanka has been upto! Scoring 260+ in 20 overs!

I never like the manner in which the Sri Lankans play their cricket, especially their batting. They always believe in hitting the ball hard, no grace in their batting at all. (Except for yesteryears Arjuna Ranatunga and Arvind De Silva). To dig into the matter more, I decided to compare two legends of our times, Sanath Jaysuriya and Sachin Tendulkar. I decided to check who is technically more correct and successful batsman.

Let us take up the ODIs first. We also choose one of the best bowling line-up of our times Australia. This sort of rationalizes the analysis. Jaysuriya has played 43 innings so far against Australia at an average of 23.10 scoring an aggregate of 924 runs. Sachin on the hand has played 47 innings, at an average of 46.45 scoring an aggregate of 2183 runs! Since there is not much difference in the number of innings played, I think the numbers confirm the class of these two players in this version of the game against quality bowling.

Now for the Test Cricket version, which actually "tests" the consistency, class and longevity of a player. Again we rationalize against Australia. Jaysuriya has played 20 innings at an average of 32.89 aggregating 592 runs. Sachin has played 39 innings at an average of 53.11 aggregating 1859 runs! Playing more innings and yet maintaining above 50 average against the best bowling line-up says it all.

Not just with Australia, if you compare the records with other good attacks, like Pakistan or England one will find similar difference in performance. All these statistics are available at http://www.howstat.com/cricket/home.asp

All these numbers set aside, is not a pleasure to see Sachin punch one down the ground in the batsman's "V", than to see Jaysuriya lob it over covers with his legs placed awkardly?

The Cryogenics

India successfully launched its fourth GSLV (GSLV-F04) and fifth in total, last Sunday. Along with it, it deployed the next generation INSAT-4CR multi-role satellite, needed desperately for the communication systems, since the last GSLV launch was unsuccessful. The previous one crashed because one of the four strap on boosters on the rocket had malfunctioned seconds after it took off .

Even this launch was dramatic. The countdown halted 15 seconds to zero, since the onboard computer did not get the "clear" signal from the cryogenic stage. Manual intervention was required to rectify the problem. The GSLV-F04, is a three stage 49 m high rocket. The last stage is the cryogenic stage and this is what bothers me to write this blog.

Even for this launch we used the Russian supplied cryogenic engine. As per the official standing, India has successfully "hot tested" the "Cryogenic Upper Stage" on October 2006. It is scheduled for a live performance with the GSLV-D3 this year. But will we make it? I hope so.

The speed with which ISRO built and launched the F04, (in about 12-13 months time), indicates two things, that there is a strong political will to get along with the space programme (since nothing moves here, without the politicians' will) and there is definitely a repeatable and manged process in place, in our design, manufacture and implementation of rocket launches. Maybe ISRO should apply for a CMMI certification!

Another reason for the government's curiosity with building rockets is its missile defense programme. A healthy space programme of a nation, is always accompanied by a strong and powerful missile defense system . The critics of space and missile programme cried like in hell, when the GSLV and Agni III failed last year around July. I for one was absolutely certain, that the causes for the failures were isolated in both cases and more to with manufacturing defects. I was therefore not surprised, when the Agni III was launched successfully in April this year and now the GSLV.

Values of Education

"OP Maashi" visited our house today. She is one of our most closest family friends. She was widowed a couple of years ago and from then on she mostly visits religious places across the country.

As she was talking to me, she gave me a bad news. She said that, when 'Mesho' (her husband), was admitted to the ICU, in the adjacent cell, the founder of my school, was admitted too. Our founder expired a little later after 'Mesho'. She was all in praise for the commitment of the founder's daughter (who is the principal of our school), and her two nieces, one of whom is a public figure in journalism, during the entire crisis period.

I remember her. She was very lady-like. We used to celebrate her birthday on the 20th of November, as "Founder's Day" in our school. We used to present her with cards and flowers, she always admired the cards which were made by ourselves.

She was one, who laid more stress on grooming personal values into the students, even more than academic education. I remember an incidence, when she scolded a student for not keeping eye contact, as he was giving the reason for not doing his homework. Her argument was, if you are speaking the truth, then you should not be fearful to tell it. If you are lying... then obviously you do not have the courage and thus avoiding eye contact.

I always thank god that I have good people around me, along with the bad ones. Be it in my school, colleges and even in my offices. I have worked with people, who have taught me to decide whether the action I am contemplating would be correct or wrong under the circumstances.

The Idol of India

I mostly "hear" television. The TV blares out in the other room, while I pick up the bits and pieces now and then. I hate the type of stuffs that are aired these days at prime time, the "expert" news-talk shows, the Ekta Kapoor style "K" serials (yuk!), the money-spinning quiz shows and worst of all, the singing talent-hunts.

Yesterday, it was too much. Some guy named "Chang" was voted out by the public. One of the judges was so upset that she left the show! She proclaimed that he was her "Idol", come what may. What the hell! Being judges of these shows itself, is so demeaning. The judges are merely placed to attract public attention, by indulging in mud-slugging and showing pseudo favoritism.

In the earlier days, artists had to struggle constantly to achieve a position in the singing industry. There was only one music company and a handful of music directors. The situation is now much better. This not only allows young artists to showcase their talents, but also makes them disappear from the scene in a flash.

Since young people are involved, things have taken a very vulgar turn too. Most of the music videos are unwatchable with the family and not to speak about the double meaning lyrics in the songs. The argument given in favour of these... freedom of expression and art.

Freedom of art gives license to the artists in our country to paint Goddesses of a religion in the nude and get away with it!

Is a writer, poet, painter, singer or lyricist above the society in which she is living? Does she have the right to hurt other person's sentiments?... maybe I'm old fashioned.

Doosra Banbaas

Bought a nice poetry book "Doosra Banbaas" today. This is a collection of "Ghazals" and "Nazms" by one of the greatest Urdu poets of our times Kaifi Aazmi.

I have been reading his poetry only sparsely till now, I find his poetry very realistic and full of life. Even if he is describing something remorse, it is decorated and presented in a manner that encapsulates your own sorrow along with.

I once saw a video of him in a "mushaaiyra" in Karachi. He was very upset, when the photographers surrounded him clicking away, and distracting him from reciting. He quipped to them, "Dekhiye meri tasveeren itni na lijiye, nazm khatarnaak hai, kahin giraftaar na ho jaayoon, in tasveeron ki wajah se." He then went on to recite "Berooni Andaaz".

Concluding, just four lines from the nazm "Ahteeyaat" in "Doorsa Banbaas". I find such a format of poetry very easy and free to write in. Something that a 'ghazal' does not provide. But then the magic of 'ghazal' is different altogether.

अब तुम आग़ोश-ए-तसव्वुर में भी आया न करो,
तुमको ये रस्म भी दुनिया न निभाने देगी,
बढ़ के दामन से लिपट जाएगी यूँ ताज़ा बहार,
मेरी आग़ोश-ए-तसव्वुर में न आने देगी।

Appreciating Rupee

Ok, so I thought I would purchase the subscription to comics.com. This is so because I thoroughly enjoy the Dilbert strips on my Windoze Vista Side bar. Now when I checked the prices, it made my brain charter into different thought process all together.

Well, it is currency of the subscription I will be talking about. 19.95 USD, for one year subscription. Typical of the Indian mentality, I went ahead to convert it into INR. Ummm.... well 19.95*40=798~800 Indian bucks! for 1 year! Now, this is cheap...

What I mean is that USD has definitely become cheaper in the last few months. Heard a lot about this in the media, and it felt good to feel it actually! Thinking further, I realized that it is now cheaper to buy in USD (Imports are cheaper). But then the flip side, which the media is talking all about, exporters are taking a hit on their profit margins, since most of our export bills are invoiced in USD.

Earlier the RBI used to intervene, and deliberately purchase USD from the forex markets to keep it costly. It would pump in the Indian currency into the market. In the recent past it has sort of "washed its hands off". It seems, it wants INR to appreciate against USD. If we compare the exchange rate of China with USD ... it is at around 7 yuan (CNY) per dollar. Does this attract the foreign investors more there than in India?

Well, as an Indian, it feels good that our currency is gaining strength. We should not be afraid of it. The exporters (including the Indian I.T. organizations) should strive for more business to offset this deficit in their profit margins. It is more important for us to get our Oil cheaper (The Oil Pool deficit will be less) which impacts the larger masses of the country, than to have my quarterly bonus above 100%!!

Another Memorable Day

Today (6th August 2007) is another memorable day for me. Guess what? Not that this will change my life in any way whatsoever, but it makes me laugh and cry at the same time. The emotional clock zoomed backwards for a second!

I don't have the courage all right, but then this is again something that I will remember like those other events in my life. And yes, like in the earlier instances... I have a snapshot of the event.... however unlike the earlier ones, which are etched in my brain's memory, this time it is in more materialistic terms.... a console screen-shot of the event!

Ok, this may have been an abstract post for all of you, but then I had to put it down somewhere...

Rohit's memorable weekend

This weekend must have been one of the most memorable weekend for Rohit. I've mentioned about him in earlier posts, that he is crazy about JS and his music. He had all the plans to meet the maestro on 30th June, but his plans were ruined by the rain gods!

He was very very upset that day. He called me up, SMSed me and when we met for the concert kept on speaking about the lost oppurtunity. I should not forget his kindness, he had included me from the beginning for the meet. I told him however "Waqt se pahle aur qismat se zyada kuch nahi milta". But I was equally sad to miss the opp.

It seems with the "Shani" changing its planetary position on Saturday, time went in his favour! He kept on calling me in the evening and I noticed his call only after 3 missed ones. His voice was filled with excitement. He said that he had talked to Abhinav Upaddhyay, the senior tabla player in JS's team, over the phone, moments ago. This was facilitated by another great fan of JS, Naresh, who was attending the Ahemedabad concert on the 19th. Rohit kept on speaking about the new 'opportunities' that were open for him.

At around midnight, (12:36 A.M) on Sunday, I got a SMS from Rohit. It said that he had just had a talk with JS on phone! In that short textual message I could virtually see what he must have experienced minutes ago. A burning desire in his heart for 10 years, fulfilled!

I know what it means to have such passionate desires fulfilled. I consider myself lucky, that I was probably the first or the second one to whom he may have disclosed this. I have not talked to Rohit, after this episode. I will let him savor the moment some more... and then ask him about the details of the conversation he had with JS.

JS Live

I attended my first concert of Jagjit Singh on 30th June. This was at Siri Fort, New Delhi. Many thanks to Rohit, for arranging my pass. May god bless him!

Hearing the master live is indeed an experience one will always cherish. He sang for around 2 hours excluding the 15-min break. The flights were delayed from Mumbai due to continuous rains, and thus the concert started late by almost 2 hours!

The first 'ghazal' that he sang was 'Der lagi aane mein 'humko''.... and was accompanied only by the flutist and the guitarist. His half team had not yet arrived!! This proved to be a boon in disguise for us, as we could hear his bare voice. His voice is so soothing even at this age!

However he kept his choice of ghazals/songs as per the taste of the larger public. No difficult urdu poetry (in fact, no urdu poetry at all). Only exception was "Baazeecha-e-Atfaal hai". He does not sing this often in his concerts.

At Last, we left at around 11:15 P.M. Our group constantly discussing that he should have sung some "new numbers" and his rare compositions which he used to sing around 35-40 years ago.

Maybe god will fulfill our desires someday!

Just four Lines

I wanted to post these two couplets, which have been all over my mind for the last few days:

Dil gayaa thaa, to yeh aankhen bhi koyi le jaata,
Main faqat ek hi tasveer kahan tak dekhun.
- Ahmed Nadeem Qasmi.

Chand lamhe jo tere qurb ke mil jaaten hain,
Inhi lamhon ko main, sadeeyon mein badaltaa dekhun.
- Iftikaar Imaam Siddiqui.

Paths of Love

I was watching an episode from the serial 'Kirdaar', when this thought came to my mind. 'Kirdaar' was aired on Doordarshan, long time ago. This episode was titled 'Alaan'. This was a short story of a master and her maid ('Alaan') having a liking for each other, but they could not cross over the threshold of their social status to develop it into a full fledged love relationship . As is usual in such cases of relationship, the woman was more expressive in her likeness than the man. The actors were excellent in their performances. The man's role was played by Om Puri and the woman's role by Mita Vasishth.

At the end of the serial, I realized the "Paths of Love" which had been in concept form in my mind for a long time.

There are very broadly 3 paths that a love relationship can progress between a man and a woman.

1. In this path, the either person expresses his or her love to the other. The other eventually accepts the proposal and the lover relationship is established between them. It also eventually turns up into a life-long relationship. This is the only happy situation.

2. In this path too, the acceptance is there. The relationship between the lovers is also established. However somewhere down the line, something goes terribly wrong and the relationship breaks. The reasons could be many. One major reason is non-understandability between the two. I think half of the cases are because of this reason.

3. In this path, the first step itself is not achieved! Just like that it happened in 'Alaan'. It is very necessary for either of the man or woman to explicitly say/ask to the other, "I love you. Do you love me?" or things to that effect. Mere actions and stares are not enough. They act like indicators only. Yes agreed, that it takes a lot of courage, but then love is a game for the strong hearted!

Dil mein na ho jurrat to muhabbat nahi milti,
Khairaat mein itni bari daulat nahi milti.
-- Nida Fazli

Meeting Niranjan P.

Today was a day that I will remember always. I met Niranjan. Well, his full name is Pradeep Niranjan. This was the first time in my life, that I met a person with same name, in flesh.

Pradeep is based in Bangalore. It is not that we were strangers before today. We share a lot common interests, and met in Orkut, in a Jagjit Singh community. Of course, I should not forget, Rohit's contribution in knitting the web together. Pradeep is a music buff. He is also a very good poet. He is learning to play the violin too.

Pradeep, Rohit and I met at CP today afternoon, as Pradeep had come to Delhi to catch a connecting flight to Bangalore. After loitering about the area, we finally found shelter from the scorching heat of the summer inside a "Coffee Day" outlet. Well, it was jam-packed and we had no choice but to enter the smoking zone. It was too stuffy, and the smoke the guys and the gals made with their burning cigarettes was making the matters worse. At last we found a better place, and discussed to our heart's content our favorite topic, Rare collections of Jagjit Singh.

We then made some good purchases of music albums and old TV serial DVDs, from Palika Bazaar. It was six fifteen, when Pradeep boarded an auto-rickshaw for the airport. Rohit and me exchanged greetings and went our way.

All in all, today was a nice day in my life.

Experience with Vista

I am one of those, who love to hate the products from Redmond. I always preferred Linux for Operating system and Open Office for word processing. I am mostly against its blatant use of monopoly over the desktop software. However, frankly I find the GUI of Windoze much more smoother in operation than other OSs. (Never tried a Mac. PC though).

Finally, I went for Vista Home Premium. Got it installed on my PC, and the first thing that I expected it to do was to wipe out my XOSL boot loader from the MBR. It did! But what I did not expect was poor driver support, especially for my Sound Card and Ge Force 6200 video card. The SoundMax driver was automatically updated by Vista, however.

Tragedy struck when I played an AVI file in Windows Media Player 11. The screen went blank, and I received my first BSOD, after the era of Windows 98. It caused physical damage to my newly purchased SATA 250 GB drive. Frantic search on the Internet revealed that this a known problem, as NVidia is struggling to release stable drivers for Vista.

Yesterday, I however stabilized my PC. I purchased a new Barracuda 160 GB hard drive, and configured it as Primary Master. I had to use my existing installation of Vista to format the new disk drive. I re-installed and re-activated Vista.

Today I found a neat software, EasyBCD that provides a GUI interface to modify the Boot Loader of Vista. Now I am able to boot to my Linux partition as well. For video files I will wait for NVidia before they either give up releasing new drivers or release a stable one. In the former case, I will have to choose a different vendor for my next video card.

Now I am in friendship with Vista as it allows me the flexibility to switch to my favorite OS anytime I wish.

Refreshing

After all the hectic work in office last week, I finally got a reward. Some kind-hearted soul mailed me a very rare recording of Jagjit Singh, live in concert.

The master was in full mood in that concert, and often broke away from the normal rendition either to explain the meaning of the 'sher' or the 'baariki' of the 'raag' on which he had composed the particular 'ghazal'.

Especially, I was mesmerized when he suddenly and so soothingly switched to a semi-classical 'thumri' midway from his famous "Hoton Se Chu Lo Tum", to render:

Dekho sakhi humaari piya ki yahi reet,
Humse bair auran ke saath preet....

Marvelous!! He is a gem!
May god bless him!

Sky Scrapper on Highway

This thought occurred to me early in the morning when I peered out of my office cab window. The cab was taking a final right turn towards Udyog Vihar, and leaving behind the hulla-gulla of National Highway - 8.

Not long ago, (4 years ago to be precise), my friend Mukesh and I used to toil on this road, with our fresher's profile in search of I.T. companies. At that time the side opposite to Udyog Vihar was barren land, and had only two high rise buildings, The "Ship Building" and the DLF-Square building. We could walk on the side of the highway or if we could afford, board a rickshaw to our destination.

Now, there are huge structures, and many multinational organization's offices in them, their Trade Mark displayed glitteringly on the buildings at strategic locations. Even my ex-client has moved into one such sky-scrapper. It is dangerous to walk on the sideway now, with the fly-over constructed on the highway vehicles now ply at great speeds.

India definitely has more money now. That is bothering the Reserve Bank, it wants to squeeze money out of the markets to contain inflation! And what about those children who still have to spend their day searching the dustbin for waste food, rather than get proper education? How will they ever reap the benefits of "Rising India"?

Lazy Day

There are days when the lazy bone in you becomes active. Today was one such day. I did not feel like rising from the bed in the morning. Neither, did I want to shave before going to office (and I didn't in fact!).

The Office resembled like the school today. Just like those text-books, I did not feel like going through the code, or the priority cases reported by the client. Just fiddled with the keyboard, checked my mails, attended a meeting (which was like the lecture we received at school) and ho... it was 5:30 P.M!

Thank god it's Friday!

The reason for this laziness and this detachment? I attribute to the couplet of Faiz Ahmed Faiz, rendered beautifully by my three favourite singers, Beghum Akhtar, Mehdi Hassan and Jagjit Singh:

Kar rahaa thaa ghum-e-jahaan ka hisaab,
Aaj tum yaad be-hisaab aaye.

Its HOT HOT HOT!!!

The day began with a nice summer sunshine. By the afternoon, as I peeked out of the window after publishing my first blog, I saw that the clouds had overtaken the task from the sunlight to fill the sky. The climate was dull and uninteresting.
Hasn't it been days since "Makar Sankranti" and "Holi" have gone past? This changing climate, this unpredictable behavior of nature is indicative of the "Global Warming" which every environmentalist, politician and media source is talking about.

What are we doing about it? A quick "Google" on the topic is horrifying enough. Will mother nature extinct us, like the dinosaurs? God knows!

Craziness

Heard Nida Fazli speaking in an interview on radio today. After reciting his 'ghazal' at a gathering in Lahore, he was being greeted, when few "daarhi waale" surrounded him. Nida had recited his famous ghazal,
Apna ghum leke kahin aur na jaaya jaaye,
Ghar mein bikhri huyi cheezon ko sajaaya jaaye.

Ghar se masjid hai bahut door chalo yun kar lein,
Kisi rote huye bachche ko hasaaya jaaye.

The men asked Nida, if he thought that a child was greater than a mosque. Nida retorted back saying that he did know who was greater, but he knew that a mosque is built by the hands of men, while a child is created by the hands of the god.

Was just wondering, when would man realize that god is above everybody and everything that we humans create... places of worship, idols, stones, symbols, religion, rituals.....

Ibtedaa

So, this starts my tryst with electronic blogging. Obviously, I have indulged in "analog blogging" at so many places... (Home and mostly with friends)... Never felt the need to put it down in electronic format. Well let us see, how this gets along, at the moment I am all excited about it.

Ibtedaa-e-ishque hai rotaa hai kyaa,
Aage aage dekhiye hotaa hai kyaa.

-- Meer Taqi Meer.